I had the most wonderful morning yesterday after an even more wonderful night's sleep. The day was long and boring, however, and last night the wind kicked up and so I didn't sleep as well last night, but I think today will be good.

I'm patiently tracking my new computer. I think it'll be here by Friday, but it's been an interesting trip. It shipped from Shanghai on Saturday and yesterday was up near Pat in Anchorage. This morning it's in Ontario, so maybe it'll be here tomorrow. Then I'll have a lot of work to do transferring files and such. Fun fun fun.

My in-laws leave in about 2 weeks for the summer. This year they're being work campers in Montana in an RV park near Yellowstone. We're thinking of shipping DS up there for a week or two as he hasn't made any commitment to camps or anything else and there is no summer school due to cutbacks. I can't have him sitting in his room on the computer all summer. DH and I are going to make him take golf lessons with us, but that'll only be once a week.

Good morning all! I ended up with a hamburger for dinner last night, but I did get my run in at the park so am not letting hamburger worry me. It was a fantastic one, from Five Guys. All fresh ingredients, etc. If you have to do a hamburger and fries, do it from a place with all fresh ingredients that posts a sign every day with the info on where their potatoes came from.

Dagmar - punching bags are great for stress. I love mine. It is hard to find a social circle anywhere. I don't have much of one in person, either. Moving to a smaller town might help, but then you wouldn't be able to continue the job that you love, so wouldn't be a great trade off in my opinion. Someone on here, Jessica maybe?, found a reading group through Meetup I think?. Is that something available where you are?

Mel - thanks for popping in and checking out the dress!

Gary - thanks to you and Angie for your dress thoughts! I don't think I have a philosophical problem with the 'what if' feelings from boys who didn't (or even boys who did) ask me out. Part of the fun of the reunion, isn't it And ice in beer was called a 'party foul' when I was in school!

Allison - your computer has had an interesting trip! Sounds like a great opportunity for DS to go to Montana with your in-laws this summer.

Dagmar, definitely check out online meetup sites. My cooking club is via meetup.com, and we've met all our local friends through it. (Not that we spend much time with them, but hey, at least we know people!) I did a quick lookup and it looks like there are a lot of meetup groups in Toronto (that's where you live, right?).

Iris, I hope your symposium goes well on Friday and that the stress goes away quickly.

Happy to be, way to go on hitting your workout. I’m new at maintaining and at this point I don’t want to or more parts of my body will have loose, crepe-y skin and that looks so yucky.

Shannon, on the XS size – I’ve noticed it in the stores lately and wondered if it’s relatively new so that the old medium is the new small. I’m an 8 and should be in medium but tend to have to buy smalls. Is this another trick of the fashion industry like when they made every size a little bigger? I was staring at a baggy small top a couple months ago wondering what the very small people can wear now. Anywho… I’m glad you ordered the dress – it is gorgeous!

Dagmar, aw – we must be in the same age range. I just loved the partridge family – Danny was my favorite. Who says you don’t have a big social circle? You have us. 3FC is pretty much social circle plus my 4 dogs and their trainer.

Gary, LOL – I loved your reasons against the dress.

Allison, here’s hoping the computer shows up in the next day or two. I bet your DS would love Yellowstone for a week. I think it would be a blast.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas. The depressing weather went to a new April low this morning. We have a few inches of snow and the junk is still falling from the sky. In years past, I’d already had my pool open by this time. I’m thinking I could ice skate on it at this point. So the melancholy is back a little but not too bad. I praised my 4WD Jeep on the way to work today as they must have parked the plows for the year and left us drivers to our own devices.

On a happy note, my exercise oomph is still going. I nailed the time/distance on my elliptical this morning and breathed heavily as a reward. Yeah!Marie

__________________Dedicated to logging every morsel for the next three months. Clearly that three months will never end.

marie - have you seen any improvement in your crepe-y skin yet? i've lost 145lbs now and i am not seeing much improvement over this past year (i am only about 10lbs lighter now than i was a year ago)... just wondering if it ever improves (surgery is not an option for me)...

i SOOO love exercise! i swear i would do it all day long if i could !

i do agree that many stores are selling clothes with tags that are deceiving... i wear anything from an 8 to a 16 depending! in a fitted party dress i am an XL, in jeans from Costco I am an 8 ... go figure!!! i really dont care anymore though... i am sooo happy to feel this way... to feel so strong, alive, powerful! who cares what the size is?!?!?

i make my own hamburgers and i find them more satisfying than buying one - i guess because i make them on-plan and can relish the real bbq flavor

Ummm, burgers. I'd opt for an In-And-Out any day, but it's too far to drive and I usually make my own. A local grocery store here sells jalapeno burgers in their meat department. They make some really good homemade burgers (although huge, I can usually only eat half).

Don't talk to me about clothing sizes! I'm a size 0.5 at Chico's which, according to their size chart in the changing rooms, is a small or a 4-6 size. I go and get some shorts at Macy's and try on a 6 and 8 and can only fit in the 8. Then if I go to Sports Authority and try on shorts, I can never fit in anything less than a 10 or sometimes a 12. It really makes buying clothes complicated AND a lot more difficult if you want to order online.

I make my own 93/7% beef burgers (4 oz) on Oroweat's 100 cal thin WW buns with one wedge of laughing cow. 300 cals and I like them way better than anything I've had out. But then, I haven't had a restaurant of fast food burger in over 25 years. So how would I know?

Cloth sizing is horrible. At least at the small end of the sizing spectrum, having a range of 6-10 is not mental sabotaging as the 14-18 range on the other end.

happy, I had an arm lift, tummy tuck and neck lift for the crepe-y skin in February. I'm 97% pleased with the results but I never want to do any more. The last 5 pounds made some crepe-y skin on my thighs and if I lose more, it will get really nasty so that's why I don't want to lose more. No thigh lift for me. I picture the incision and shake in fear.
Marie

__________________Dedicated to logging every morsel for the next three months. Clearly that three months will never end.

OMG! I googled LC - I just couldn't resist as I'd never heard of him before. Who needs Sominex? Ambien? I think morphine would still be needed to alleviate the pain. Perhaps it's just the Stranger Song that was so excruciating but I am not will to chance it again.

PS sorry to all the LC fans out there.

__________________Dedicated to logging every morsel for the next three months. Clearly that three months will never end.

Allison, Anchorage is a large hub for cargo, especially to/from Asia. We have more cargo flights than passenger flights.

Dagmar, I think finding new friends while working alone is very hard. Most of my friends I've met either through work, hobbies (quilting for me), or as friends of friends. I have two exceptions and those are two women I knew in New England who also moved here! It's one reason we've decided not to move even tough retirement costs more here, and the weather gets to us more and more (alleviated by more travel ).

I'm leaving tonight to join my DH in New England. I'm taking my laptop but I don't know how much I'll have a connection. My BIL has only dial-up! Eeek. My sister exists with an aircard. So it'll be coffee shops, libraries and airports. ANd thank goodness for the last - my flight leaves at 2 am, and my friend is dropping me off a little after 10 pm. Anchorage has free wireless, so I can surf to my heart's content (sitting on the floor near the outlet most likely )

I always end up trying on several sizes of clothing. WHen I find pants I like the fit of, I buy them in every color! BUt once your clothes are on, no one knows what size they are! And everyone feels better in clothes that fit right, no matter the size.

__________________Pat

"Promise me you'll always remember: You're braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think." Christopher Robin to Pooh

Arrrrrrrrrgh, I am SO mad at my MIL right now! Sometimes she does things that are so thoughtless you wonder if she really just didn't realize that what she was doing would upset you, or if she did it on purpose to be passive-aggressive. So, we've known for months that my sister is getting married at the end of August. When we bought our plane tickets, we checked with DH's parents to see if they would be able to watch our dog while we are gone. They said absolutely, no problem, they would watch the dog. We told them the dates we would be gone, they said that was fine.

Yesterday we happened to stop by their house, and MIL was like, what were the dates again that you will be gone? I need to put it on my calendar. I was surprised it wasn't already on their calendar, but whatever. She said, "Wasn't it near Labor Day?" I said yes, it was at the end of august up until labor day and gave her the dates. She says, "Oh, it looks like I scheduled us to go on vacation then. Hm, I wonder why I did that."

Apparently, even though she had agreed to watch the dog and knew that we were going to be gone at the end of August around labor day, she scheduled herself and FIL to go on vacation that same exact week. (Note that she must have scheduled this AFTER agreeing to watch the dog.) She says, oh, well, I guess Isaac (my BIL, he lives with them right now) can watch the dog. BIL, meanwhile, has no idea what his schedule will be like then and cannot commit to something this far ahead. DH was like, well, what were you planning to do with YOUR dog while you were on vacation? She hadn't even thought about it. FIL didn't even know that they were scheduled to go on vacation.

The whole thing is just so irritating. I mean, if she had come and said, hey, sorry, but we have a conflict and won't be able to watch the dog, it wouldn't be as irritating. But she just double-scheduled, didn't even think to let us know, and didn't even seem to be sorry about it at all. I would be so much less angry if she would just say she was sorry.

In any case, I spent the past night and this morning fighting with DH about hiring dog sitters. He is convinced that if we hire a dog sitter they will (a) cost a massive amount of money, (b) steal things from our house, and (c) Carter will eat them. Ugh. It would be great if BIL could watch the dogs (ours and DH's parents') because he loves dogs and I know he would give Carter lots of love and attention. But if he can't commit to it then we need to make other arrangements because I know dog sitters' schedules fill up fast.

we realize we had dumped all the ice on the ground...so we proceed to pick up ice that was... a bit...OK..a little more than a bit grassy....

Seeing as how we already had quite a buzz from drinking probably 3 beers each in record time we said "what the heck and put the dirty ice in with the beer"...[/b]

Gary, I'm sure all the alcohol from the beer sterilized any dirt on the grass. Which just provided some extra fiber for your diet. No worries.

I had a really rough day at work yesterday. I need to start commuting to take classes or something... anything... get me out of this job (while not making me move away from the area - there's the tough part - nothing else available in my field here)!

Jessica, sorry your MIL scheduled here vacation for the same time as your trip and then didn't apologize for not being able to watch Carter. How about a dog boarder's? My mom doesn't like the boarders where she lives but there is a really nice one near where I live, where the dogs get lots of personalized attention. I'm sure Dagmar can give some advice here... (maybe if you bought her a plane ticket she'd house sit Carter for you!).

Dagmar, I am shy around people I don't know so it's hard to make friends for me, too. I have a lot of acquaintances here in FL but not too many actual friends, most met through work and through my BF. If I'm going to a social event I will actually practice a few items of small talk in my head that I can bring up to people until the conversation gets flowing. I did meet some people when I joined my theatre group, since theatre's always been an interest of mine. I try to make new people feel really welcome now whenever someone new joins us. I remember Jessica joined a cooking club when she moved. Maybe you could look in the paper or even google search social groups and clubs for your area - a biking group? hiking? a dinner club? a dog or cat lover's group? I've found the gym is a great place to meet people. Maybe try to chat with other people you meet with dogs when you're out walking all of your charges?

Marie, glad you had a good workout this morning! Sorry the weather has got you down. I hope the sun & warmth comes soon.